Katherine Giscombe, PhD, designs and directs customized, comprehensive, and solutions-based change initiatives with Catalyst member organizations. With a long history at Catalyst and in the corporate world, she helps members use Catalyst knowledge as they create business-driven diversity and inclusion initiatives. She led Catalyst’s groundbreaking study, Women of Color in Corporate Management: Opportunities and Barriers, and several subsequent in-depth research projects on diverse women. Drawing from this unique background, Dr. Giscombe infuses her work as part of Global Member Services with an “insider/outsider” perspective. She raises awareness of, and generates solutions to, the subtle obstacles that still must be overcome for women of color and other marginalized groups to succeed in the workplace. In the process, she strengthens the workplace for all.

Dr. Giscombe has extensive corporate work experience, having supported marketing and new product development at a variety of Fortune 500 companies prior to joining Catalyst. She is a highly effective speaker, workshop leader, and a Catalyst media spokesperson, having been interviewed by National Public Radio, CNN-FN, CBS Radio, the Boston Globe, and ARISE News among others. Dr. Giscombe was selected by The Network Journal as one of “25 Influential Black Women in Business” in 2005, received the 2007 “Legacy of Leadership” award from Spelman College Center for Leadership and Civic Engagement, and was named by Profiles in Diversity Journal as a “Woman Worth Watching” in 2009. She is currently on the Advisory Board for Women’s Inter-Cultural Exchange, a nonprofit organization that builds and bridges social capital among women of diverse cultures.

Dr. Giscombe has a PhD in Organizational Psychology from the University of Michigan and trained at the Institute for Social Research, the world’s largest academic social science survey and research organization.

Report

While diversity and inclusion (D&I) programs have been in place in many organizations for some time, these programs have not been completely successful at eliminating bias. To further support successful navigation of workplaces by diverse women, leadership by managers and senior leaders in the...